AAAhhh...I'm back. Finally. Had a real hectic week so I apologize for not updating a post throughout this week.

So we're off to California Speedway for the Sharp AQUOS 500. Since I've been out of touch this week and not paying all that much attention to what's going on, I'm not going wild and crazy on my pick for this weekend. I'm playing it safe and going with Matt Kenseth, who has won two of the last three races in Fontana.

According to NASCAR, if after the completion of the AQUOS 500 a driver has a 196-point lead over 13th position, they will have clinched a spot in the Chase.

Qualifying is 6 p.m. tonight on ESPN and the green flag is scheduled to wave 8 p.m. Sunday, on ESPN.

Have a great Labor Day weekend folks! I'll be back to posting daily next week...

I wasn’t all that thrilled with the race at Bristol Saturday night. There really wasn’t all that much excitement, or at least not what I’m used to seeing when I watch a Bristol night race. Kasey Kahne appeared to be the car to beat but that didn’t happen.

While leading the race, Kahne came up on Michael Waltrip who was already two laps down, and instead of Waltrip getting out of the way, he decided to race the leader, which allowed Carl Edwards and Dale Earnhardt Jr. to close in on him. Carl Edwards took the lead and it basically stayed that way until the checkered flag.

Honestly, I can’t understand why Waltrip wouldn’t have just gotten out of the way and let the leaders battle it amongst themselves. It was a bone-head move and he cost Kahne the lead.

The bad luck continued for Jeff Gordon. He pitted under green-flag conditions. The caution came out due to a spin by David Ragan, which put Gordon a lap down on the restart. Then a little later in the race, Gordon was involved in a wreck due to Martin Truex Jr. getting into Ricky Rudd.

Let me repeat that. Martin Truex Jr. got into Rudd, kind of like he got into Juan Pablo Montoya at Watkins Glen. HHHmmm…

On to the Busch race…

Kasey Kahne won the Busch race on Friday night.

I have to admit I didn’t get a chance to watch it. And someone, I won’t name any names, stopped the dvr while it was taping. My brother-in-law said that NASCAR screwed Kyle Busch.

I guess Busch was acting like he was going in the pits and veered back out onto the track like so many drivers do, but NASCAR penalized him saying he hit the commitment line. The crew argued this with the officials but to no avail and NASCAR sent him back to 28th position on the restart.

NASCAR later said they were wrong and apologized. Now let me ask you, what good does that do? It certainly doesn't or didn't do a bit of good for Kyle Busch. Busch ended up finishing fourth but who knows where he would have finished if he hadn't had to start so far back.

Bristol's a tough race track to predict because just about anything can happen there. It is one of my most favorite race tracks. The night race, in particular is the absolute best.

I must say that I was a bit wavered in picking Dale Earnhardt Jr. in Saturday night's Sharpie 500 because of something one of my friends said to me. He said that he had a feeling that Junior didn't want to qualify into the chase just because of Teresa.

I do hope that's not true. I don't want to believe that for a second. Does anyone else feel that way?

In any event, I AM going to pick Junior for the win at Bristol tomorrow night. I know I must sound like a broken record in picking him but there you have it.

My other pick is a little more out there but I'm going with him, it's Ryan Newman. He has finished in the top-10 the last three races here.

Bud Pole Qualifying starts at 3 p.m. today. The weather doesn't appear to be a factor. The race is scheduled to start at 8 p.m. on Saturday.

Busch Pole Qualifying is today at 4:30. The green flag is scheduled to wave at the Food City 250 tonight at 8 p.m. And because I love Bristol so much, I will definitely be watching the Busch race this evening.

Kenny Wallace will again be the fill-in driver for Kyle Petty in Saturday night's race at Bristol Motor Speeday. Petty was so mad at his misfortune at Watkins Glen that he punched a door inside his hauler and broke his hand.

Sterling Marlin will try to qualify the No. 78, Furniture Row car at Bristol.

Let's hope that the weather doesn't play a roll in qualifying.

I am still waiting on the announcement from DEI on who will be driving the No. 8 car in 2008. A decision could be announced by the end of the week. Who do you think it will be?

It hasn't been announced yet which car number Junior will be driving.
(I think I'd like to see him drive the 6.7)

The 3M Performance 400 at Michigan is history! Kurt Busch won, distancing himself further from Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the point standings.

Junior ended up finishing 12th. I watched bits and pieces of the race here at work. From what I saw it looked like a fairly good race. As I've said before, I'm not much of a fan of Michigan. I have always found it to be a bit of a snoozer.

But from the little bit that I did watch, it looked like one of the more exciting races at Michigan.

The 3M Performance 400 at Michigan International Speedway has been scheduled to start this morning at 10am. At the moment, the weather appears to be foggy.

If NASCAR cannot get the race in today they have said they will try to get it in tomorrow but there is more rain and thunder showers scheduled for tomorrow.

If they cannot get the race in this week, NASCAR would possibly bump the Michigan race to the weekend after Thanksgiving making the Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire International Speedway the final race to qualify into the chase.

I think that would be good and bad.

Good (and I'm being pretty selfish here) because I'm going to Loudon for the race and it could be a really exciting race to watch if the points remain as close as they have been around that cut-off position of 12th in the point standings.

Bad for the poor fans that will actually go and sit in the grandstands at Michigan on November 25. It should be brutally cold that time of year.

Today is not looking much better for 3M Perfomance 400. They postponed the race at Michigan yesterday until today at noon. But the weather doesn't look all that much better.

The forecast calls for more rain today and tonight. It is looking more and more like they are going to have to hold the race tomorrow. According to NASCAR, the last time they had to postpone a race until Tuesday was Talladega in 1997.

I did not watch any part of the Busch race on Saturday. All I know is Denny Hamlin won and that's just about it. Did I miss anything exciting?

Because Sal and others mention Lorne Wallace in some of the comments and some of you may be new to the racing scene and cannot figure out who Lorne Wallace is, this is for you...

For whatever reason, I am having a real difficult time throwing together an entry for you today. I'm just not feeling it. Maybe it's because I find Michigan to be such a sleeper race.

In any event, I think I'm going to go with Dale Earnhardt Jr. for the win this weekend. He has finished in the top 10 in the last three races here, June 07, August 06, and June 06. After his bad luck last week, I think he is going to be a man on a mission. He is 100 points behind 12th place driver, Kurt Busch.

Martin Truex Jr., who is 11th in the point standings, may be another contender on Sunday. He finished 2nd here in June.

Qualifying is today at 3pm on the SPEED channel. It doesn't appear that weather is going to be a factor today but the extended forecast doesn't look all that good for Sunday.

Who are your picks for the race?

I went into a NASCAR chatroom last night. I wanted to see what the big deal was with one. I didn't participate in the discussion, rather, I just wanted to read what was going on. First thing I observed, it is REALLY difficult to keep up with the reading. Everyone has this shorthand and I was lost half the time.

Then you have people that go off on completely random discussions such as where they ate for dinner. One person said that they ate at Burger King the night before and was going to eat at Wendy's last night. I lost interest in that chat room rather quickly.

Then I decided to move on to the message board, which was also a first. Right off the bat, I was much more comfortable. The topic was basically: Who got the better deal, Gibbs or Hendrick?

I don't need to state right here what I think, I am pretty sure based on the picture with my blog you know the answer.

While I was reading all that was being said, I was just waiting for something that I wanted to chime into. It is kind of intimidating. You say one wrong thing, and you have EVERYONE that will correct you, fairly immediately.

As a matter of fact, you can get like ten people pouncing all at the same time, even before you get a chance to say, okay, okay...I made a mistake. It's really weird.

I'll be honest, my skin is thickening but I am not fully developed in that area as of yet. Journalists are great, in that it seems it doesn't faze them a bit when someone pounces back with a nasty comment.

It's a little similar to this blog, only I can correct the error before everyone pounces.

But, I would like to throw that question out to all of you...

So, I'll ask you, who do you think got the better deal, Joe Gibbs Racing or Hendrick Motorsports?

On another note, it became official yesterday that Dale Jr. will not be driving the No. 8 car for Hendrick, which was yet another discussion. People were discussing what number he should drive and whether or not tattoo shops were going to be real busy getting rid of or adding to the No. 8 that fans had tattoed on themselves.

Just because there is usually one day a week that I throw something out there that is completely off topic and a bit silly...

With Dale Earnhardt Jr. heading to Hendrick Motor Sports next year, how can the name DEI remain DEI? After all, there will be no Dale anywhere...

My suggestion: TEI, Teresa Earnhardt Inc.

Can you tell I'm a little bitter about Jr. leaving DEI? It makes me question whether or not I have to go through another round of photos for the blog. I seriously don't want to have to go through another 100 pictures to find one that I kind of like.

I think I may just keep the one I have and it will be a "remember when..."
A classic.

Another thing that I've thought about is whether or not dale3 fan ended up burning all of his/her Dale Jr. stuff. This race fan mentioned it in my entry, Dale Jr. has made a decision.

So, dale3 fan, if you're out there, did you do it? I'm just curious.

It's official. Kyle Busch has been signed by Joe Gibbs Racing. The contract runs through 2010. Here's the press release.

I'm not much of a Busch fan, so I would have to say that I think Gibbs is making a mistake in signing him. I am pretty sure that if Busch and Tony Stewart get in a tangle on the track because of a brain-dead move on Busch's part, Stewart would be much more aggressive with Busch than Kevin Harvick was with Juan Pablo Montoya this past weekend.

It will be hard for Gibbs to keep two of them in line ... thank god for Denny Hamlin.

J.J. Yeley is now on the market for a ride for 2008 and beyond. There have been reports that Yeley has been talking with Dale Earnhardt Inc. I am sure there will be a whole lot more shuffling towards the end of the season.

In case you missed the race at Watkins Glen this past weekend, this is the confrontation that happened between Juan Pablo Montoya and Kevin Harvick:

Even after Harvick acknowledges that it was Martin Truex Jr. that caused the wreck, he manages to continue verbally beating up Montoya. Montoya gets such a bad rap.

Kyle Petty was so mad at his misfortune at the Glen that he punched a door inside his hauler after the race and broke his hand. This was his first DNF this season. It is unknown if he will be able to race at Michigan this weekend. Quite honestly, I didn't know he had it in him to get wound up like that...

To make matters worse, John Andretti who they have used in the past as a backup driver in the event that Kyle couldn't drive, will not be available as a fill-in because he is driving the remainder of this year for BAM racing, driving the No. 49 car.

How ironic that Jeff Gordon spins in the same spot that Tony Stewart did earlier in the race while leading. Only this time, it cost Gordon the win. This is Stewart's third win in four weeks. He is on fire.

Imagine the tension at my Dad's house yesterday when Kevin Harvick and Juan Pablo Montoya got in a wreck. You see, I am a Montoya fan, my Dad is a die-hard Harvick fan and my husband is a fan of Martin Truex Jr.

Associated Press Photo

Harvick jumped out of his car and went over to Montoya. They exchanged words and Montoya kind of shoved Harvick back a couple times.

Harvick was interviewed after the scuffle and was asked what he was talking to Montoya about and Harvick said he was "talking about kicking Montoya's [expletive]."

I don't think Harvick is in a position in the point standings where he can afford a 25 point loss due to swearing on television, which if NASCAR is consistent, is what is going to happen.

I blame that particular wreck on Truex. My husband said it was Montoya being Montoya and my Dad was so mad he could barely speak. We kind of just decided not to discuss it any further.

On a totally different note, Bill Elliott is simply a class act. He gave Boris Said his car to drive after qualifying was rained out. He said it was the most logical thing to do because Said was just coming off a road coarse in Montreal the weekend before and Elliott hadn't raced one since June. Not to mention that Said is just phenominal at a road course.

He also wanted the Wood Brothers to have a solid finish to try to secure a top 35 position in the owner point standings. By Said finishing 14th, it did in fact bump Wood Brothers (unofficially) to the 35th owner point standings.

I’m going to go with the obvious pick this week, Robby Gordon. And you should, too. After all, he WILL turn anyone and everyone that is in his way to get to the win.

All right, all right, I’m done beating up Robby Gordon this week.

Seriously, I’m going to go with Boris Said. I like him at a road course. I always have. I have said it before and I will say it again, he is bound to get lucky one of these times.

Who do you think will win?

I had a hard time coming up with a topic this morning and one of my friends threw this one out there....drug testing.

So, let's talk about NASCAR's so-called policy for drug testing, which is basically to test on suspicion. To me, it's completely unacceptable. By the time someone is suspected of using drugs, many, many lives may have already been put at risk ... in the pits or on the track.

Not to mention the fact that if you do in fact use drugs, I would guess that you would do an awefully good job at hiding it, hence the reason for a more strict enforcement for random or regular drug testing.

I think NASCAR completely does it backwards if you ask me. They should be proactive, not reactive. For a sport that really preaches safety, they are turning a blind eye on this one.

I am almost laughing too hard to type this entry. Robby Gordon has given Marcos Ambrose a car of his to drive at the Cup race at Watkins Glen this weekend.

Of course, this is all after Gordon was fined and put on probation for intentionally spinning Ambrose in the Busch race in Montreal last weekend. Ambrose will make his Cup debut driving the No. 77 car owned by Gordon.

"There are a couple of reasons why I'm doing this," Gordon told The Sporting News on Tuesday. "The first reason is that it's unfortunate that Marcos got put in a position in Montreal where I was thinking, 'OK, if I'm not going to win, he's not going to win.' "

When I think of the race coming up ... any driver who is in front of him at Watkins Glen will be wondering, "What is Robby Gordon thinking right now?" But now that I say that ... what's new? I am sure that thought runs through every driver's head at every race that he is in.

Here's the full release from yesterday.

Here's Robby Gordon's statement that was posted on robbygordon.com.

Doesn’t Joe Gibbs have enough on his plate? And now he wants to bring Kyle Busch in? Wow. I’ve seen Busch take his own brother out of a race. I can’t wait for the day that I see him do it to Tony Stewart.

Yup, I can see it now…I will be sitting there watching the race as I always do. Busch will “accidentally” take out Stewart. I will start grinning, just waiting for the interview. I am certain it would make for an excellent blog topic the next day!

I just can’t see the two of them working together well. He is supposedly taking over the No. 18 car driven by J.J. Yeley.

If you didn’t watch the Busch race on Saturday, you missed a lot of excitement during the final laps of the road race in Montreal. Marcos Ambrose was leading the race with Robby Gordon in second place. Behind them there was a pileup, bringing out the caution.

At almost the same time Gordon had tapped Ambrose to take the lead. Ambrose caught up to the bumper of Gordon and turned him, taking the lead back. It looked like the caution flag was flying while Ambrose spun Gordon.

When they were getting ready to restart the race, NASCAR ordered Gordon back to the 14th spot based on the timing and scoring of where the caution flag waved. Gordon disagreed and refused to go back, so NASCAR black flagged him.

For the life of me, I don’t understand why on earth NASCAR would have allowed a restart with Gordon still sitting there in 2nd place while he was black flagged, but they did. Aren’t we talking about Robby Gordon? It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out what was going to happen.

On the restart Gordon took matters into his own hands and retaliated by spinning Ambrose, preventing Ambrose his first Busch series win and handing that win over to Kevin Harvick. Here's the run down.

NASCAR would not allow Gordon to race in Sunday’s Pocono race because of his blatant disregard for NASCAR directives.

Pocono was not nearly as exciting.

Uumm….did NASCAR really throw a caution for some yellow tape on the track? They didn’t seem to show any other debris anywhere else on that particular caution. Here are the unofficial results of the race.

Kurt Busch finally made it back to victory lane and put himself 12th in points, bumping Dale Earnhardt Jr. to 13th and outside the chase standings.

My pick this week is the obvious, Denny Hamlin. He won both races here in 2006 and finished sixth in June of this year. In that June race, he led most of the laps but it was pit strategy and weather that prevented him from winning.

Hopefully if my pick is correct, we will see a similar picture to this one.

Qualifying is at 3:30 this afternoon and will be aired on ESPN2.

Who's your pick for the weekend?

My friend, Shawn Courchesne from the Hartford Courant, sent me a link to this video from Onion News Network earlier this week.

Honestly, I laughed my butt off. It is truly the funniest video I have ever seen and I just had to share it with you. So turn up your volume and take the 2:46 minutes out of your day to watch this. You'll thank me later.

NASCAR Coach Reveals Winning Strategy: 'Drive Fast'

If you know of any videos that you think were hilarious. Share them. I would love to get another good laugh.

Tomorrow we can discuss Pocono.

Okay, okay, okay. Tony Stewart IS NASCAR. Is that what you want to hear? I’ve been thinking of this all morning. I read all of your comments. Then I thought back to when I was in New Hampshire in June.

Bear with me while I work through some of my thoughts.

Up until I attended that race in June, I was not much of a Jeff Gordon fan. Well actually, I’m still not. But I saw him in a different light while I was down there. He was visible. He walked around. But I noticed something as he walked down pit road to get in his car for qualifying…

He walked like a robot. He looked straight ahead and never even looked with his eyes in any direction other than straight ahead. It was eerie.

I actually felt a little bad for the guy as I was snapping the pictures of him for all of you. I almost felt like I was violating him. It didn't stop me because I had to take them for you guys.

Do you remember this picture? This is how he walked everywhere whenever I saw him. No emotion, no looking around... hands at his side, looking straight ahead. Earlier in the weekend, there was a press conference and he looked the same exact way:

Did anyone of you notice pictures of Stewart while I was in Loudon? No. He was no where to be seen. I guess he cannot control his anger about having people watching his every move like some drivers can.

So it makes sense that when he is in victory lane (a supposed place to be happy) that he let's it out and verbally abuses anyone from the media, because that's his only chance to do so. It must be a sort of purge for him.

So okay, I forgive him. It happens. It was just a slip of the tongue. Who cares that there were many thousands of young kids watching.